Asbury Park is getting a new vegan restaurant this summer! It will be the first vegan restaurant in NJ with a liquor license. We vacation in next door in Ocean Grove every summer so I hope it's open when we are down there.

We had vegan gelato at the Baci location in Garden State Plaza Mall in Paramus. . . So if anyone is in the mood for a cone of delicious vegan gelato on a warm spring day and you happen to be in Northern NJ, check it out! http://www.scooponcones.com/scoops/Baci.html

Asbury Park is getting a new vegan restaurant this summer! It will be the first vegan restaurant in NJ with a liquor license. We vacation in next door in Ocean Grove every summer so I hope it's open when we are down there.

Go to the brunch at Lalibela! I think a bunch of people we know are going, so if you want to we could make a day of it.

We went to the brunch last weekend. I might not have been in the right state of being to judge, getting over a stomach bug, but I thought it was kind of bland and excessively homey, all stuff i could make easily at home just as good or better. My tofu scramble is better (their tofu scramble sadly reminded me of the infamous Toast scramble, hasn't anyone heard of spices or black salt or anything? Just making tofu yellow does not a yummy scramble make). The gravy and biscuits were good enough. Almost everything was served on the cold side, so it was hard to judge how textures would've been if things were warm. pancakes and french toast were hockey puck like. I was a little disappointed with selection/presentation considering we paid $25/pp for brunch.

I'm looking forward to their real location and ordering off an actual menu.

Too bad Kaya is far away! All I want in life is a place really close by to get breakfast on a Sunday or lazy mid-week dinner that is American food (not that I couldn't eat Chinese, sushi, Mexican, Indian all day every day, but sometimes I just want someone else to make me a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup or something).

Go to the brunch at Lalibela! I think a bunch of people we know are going, so if you want to we could make a day of it.

We went to the brunch last weekend. I might not have been in the right state of being to judge, getting over a stomach bug, but I thought it was kind of bland and excessively homey, all stuff i could make easily at home just as good or better. My tofu scramble is better (their tofu scramble sadly reminded me of the infamous Toast scramble, hasn't anyone heard of spices or black salt or anything? Just making tofu yellow does not a yummy scramble make). The gravy and biscuits were good enough. Almost everything was served on the cold side, so it was hard to judge how textures would've been if things were warm. pancakes and french toast were hockey puck like. I was a little disappointed with selection/presentation considering we paid $25/pp for brunch.

I'm looking forward to their real location and ordering off an actual menu.

Ariann, I'm sorry you didn't have the best experience at our brunch buffet. We do serve up homestyle food in a homey atmosphere. It's definitely what we're going for. Even though we are not in our home yet, we aim to make everyone feel at home during our pop-ups. Latin, Italian and American comfort food is what we specialize in even though we all appreciate the innovation and presentation at a nice upscale vegan restaurant.

I'm sure you can make stuff similar to our menu items and it's wonderful, but most of our customers don't feel like making sausages from scratch, etc. I am surprised to hear your criticism of our scrambled tofu because along with our pancakes, we get the most compliments on this item. Every single week. I've had customers tell us that our scramble is the closest to eggs they've every had. One customer was a bit unnerved at first! And, we do use black salt. :)

I'm also surprised to hear that our food was on the cold side. We routinely burn our fingers when refilling the buffet trays. :)

I am not surprised to hear about the pancakes and french toast being "hockey puck like". Because we try to keep the food so warm, the pancakes and french toast at the bottom of the buffet trays have a tendency to dry out, especially later in the day after our rush and it's high turnover rate. We're still fine-tuning how we deal with this. Half of our crew think we should leave a hard layer down to act as a buffer for the other pancakes and FT. I, on the other hand, like to go through them every so often and pull out any that aren't stellar...then we pelt each other back in the kitchen with them. :)

I hope you do give us another try. This is the first negative comment I've heard and I would love to change your mind. Either way, thanks for giving us a shot in the first place. And, yes, having our own space and kitchen! will be most helpful.

Hi KV. Your cupcakes at the bake sale were quite tasty. Second chance! Again, I think buffets can sometimes ruin otherwise good food, so I don't think I am willing to pay another fifty bucks for another not great breakfast, but will certainly come when the restaurant opens. I checked with my husband who concurred on the "food was cold" front and thought he could maybe detect a little black salt in the tofu, but maybe not. (Answer to everything is more BLACK SALT.) He reminded me that we came at noon and you were out of rice and greens which really pissed him off actually (again, fifty bucks for brunch). Food at the wrong temp and running out of stuff halfway through service are not things that would be likely to happen in your own kitchen with food cooked to order.

I hate to say this, but I also think vegans are a terrible source of reviews for vegan businesses sometimes. There is such a desire to be supportive that nobody feels they can say anything less than stellar. I would actually be super skeptical if I only got positive reviews. Even if it's just a matter of mismatched tastes, it is bizarre for any restaurant to have 100% positive reviews - that is not a realistic response. We eat out at least twice a week and I want nothing more than a vegan diner in my neighborhood, but I am not going to have different standards for flavor and value than I do for all the non-vegan restaurants we frequent now.

Re: pancakes, have you considered just making the pancakes to order and letting people know they can ask for them? Pancakes kept warm for long periods almost always suck. It's just the nature of the pancake.

we don't want to be "the crasshole" when there are so few restaurants that cater to us. (that's another reason why a restauranteur might not hear all the negatives) i believe in constructive criticism, and don't mind being "the crasshole" so ariann, you're a-ok in my book. <3

A reminder: I want to do a BBQ during the summer at my house in Blairstown, NJ [writing down before i forget]. It could be vegapalooza type thing if we combine it with a For the Animals shindig or somethin'. I don't have the time to research what's happening this summer right now but if there's something interesting in the area that people would want to come to, it's only an hour and a half out of NYC and we could plan it. We have a lot of indoor space, kid friendly, camping outside if desired [camping elsewhere in town too if that's your thing, the AT goes through town too], animal sanctuary, maybe berry picking and such? Or we could just invite Poopiebitch up here and make pies until we all turn green, which sounds pretty attractive to me.Anyway, input welcome.

Have any of you been to the Hip Town Grill in Medford? Close to half of the menu is vegan, mainly faux meats. I'm spoiled by Native Foods and Veggie Grill at home, but it was nice to have a restaurant close by during our visit - my MIL lives at Medford Leas. Overall the menu could do with a few more veggies. But they had a white bean, fennel and escarole soup that was one of the best soups I've ever tasted. I thought it looked too strange to order, but my husband had it and I ended up stealing it from him!

_________________Formerly Kaleicious. I still love kale, but no more than lots of other garden greens too! Orach is currently my favorite.